HOMILY 27
HOMILY 27
ON PSALM 100 (101)
F KINDNESS and judgment I will sing; to you, 0 Lord.'
Let sinners who are despairing of their salvation, who are humble and broken down over their sins, hear the song of mercy; let the arrogant who say: 'The Lord is merciful, let us sin, He will pardon us,' hear the song of justice.
'I will sing praise. I will persevere in the way of integrity,' that I may understand what I am singing and meditate upon the meaning of the psalm; that my mind may not wander off on distraction; my body seem to be praying, but my soul be without fruition. 'In the way of integrity': that while I am a sojourner in this world, I may live justly with a stainless heart. 'When will you come to me?' When I shall have gained the power of discernment and lead a just life, then, with unshaken confidence, 1 shall ask the Lord: When will
You come to me? 'Will you come' is to be taken, of course, in the sense of His second coming.
'1 will walk in the integrity of my heart, within my house.'
Nothing so pleases God as simplicity and purity of heart.
The Holy Spirit, in fact, takes great pleasure in no other bird than the dove because of its simplicity, and no other quadruped than the sheep because of its gentleness.
'I will not set before my eyes any base thing.' Nothing will 1 ever choose in preference to the Lord, nor will 1 consent to evil, but with my whole being 1 shall belong to God. '1 hate him who does perversely.' Whether it be my father, my mother, brother, sister, or my friend, if anyone withdraws
SAINT JEROME
from the fear of the Lord, I will, nevertheless, hate him and have nothing to do with him. I will not set kinship nor friendship before my love and loyalty to God.
'A crooked heart shall be far from me.' There will be no obstinacy; no perversity in my dealings, only equity and justice. 'Evil I will not know.' No matter if it be my friend or relative, bishop or priest, no matter what position of dignity a man may have, if he corrupts himself in any way, I will shun him so completely that I will preserve no least remembrance of him_ 'Whoever slanders his neighbor in secret, him will I destroy.' By no means are we to agree with a slanderer, but rather, insofar as it is possible, we are to persecute the maligner, fully cognizant of the double benefit we are bestowing upon him by deliberately not listening and by not permitting him to sin. The only difference between a fornicator and detractor is, moreover, that the fornicator slays only himself, but the slanderer ruins both himself and the one who listens to him.
'With the man of haughty eyes and puffed-up heart I will not dine.'! With a man who is proud or covetous, decidedly will I have no fellowship.
'My eyes are upon the faithful of the land, that they may dwell with me.' The psalmist did not say upon the rich, or upon emperors, or bishops, or priests, or deacons, but upon the faithful; with them I will abide. A bishop who is a holy man has a right to these words for he can say: '1 do not ordain him priest who is obsequious to me, or who is my relative; I ordain him whom I know to be faithful.' Again, the same good bishop may be saying: 'for all my clergy and laity are faithful.' And he may say as well in the name of the Lord the following versicle: 'He who walks in the way of integrity shall be in my service';2 I am His loyal servant, for I Cf. Ps. 100 (101).5.
2 Cf. Against the Pelagians 1.22, PL 23.539 (718).
HOMILY 27
I do not ordain those who are related to me, but the just and the faithful.
'He who speaks falsehood shall not stand before my eyes:
So carefully do I avoid the company of anyone who disparages his neighbor that I neither believe nor ever listen to a person of that kind.
'Each morning I will destroy all the wicked of the land:
Well said: 'The wicked of the land,' for sinners are certainly earthy. This means that the enslavements which the devil suggests to me, I thrust from my heart and do not surrender to his bondage. As soon as evil thoughts are driven out, the demons are undone. The Jews, hearing this verse and following the letter that kills,S in their zeal to spill blood, killed anyone who transgressed the law. Indeed, not satisfied with the murder of the prophets, they crucified the Lord Himself.
'And uproot from the city of the Lord all evildoers.' If only we, too, could root out all evildoers from the city of the Lord!
The city of the Lord is the Church of the saints, the assembly of the just. 'And I will uproot'; I shall rebuke and reprove the sinner that he may repent and purge all evil from his heart, for the prophet has not said that the guilty man is to be expelled.4
3 Cf. 2 Cor. 3.6.
4 Cf. Commentarioli in ps. 100.8.